by Joan Davis
“Damn it, Honor. I could have hurt you. Don’t you get it? I lost control last night,” Gabriel pounded his fist against the bar-top in angry frustration. “I should have left you alone. But I looked into those damn exotic eyes of yours and . . .”
And there it was. He didn’t mean her exotic eyes. He was blaming her for being marked with ink. It was all about the forbidden and he was blaming her for enticing him with it. Heart wrenching pain tried to take hold, but Honor forced it away. It was nothing new. He was just like all the rest. Damn it, he was just like the rest, She cried inside.
For once, Honor had fooled herself into thinking that this time someone had wanted her, just Honor. Gabriel had never alluded to her tattoo. He always seemed to be looking at her and not the way the tattoo made her look. Not the fucking chick with the tattoo on her face, but Honor, ex-foster kid who was just like everybody else, just wanting to be happy and normal. What a fucking joke, Honor thought. No one was ever going to see her has anything but some kind of bizarre freak.
Ice settled over Honor like an old friend. Everything inside her shut down. It was done. It didn’t change anything in her world. It was just another day in her life. Honor calmly walked past Gabriel and out to the living room and opened the front door.
Following Honor into the living room, Gabriel saw the empty expression in her eyes. “Honor . . .” Gabriel said softly knowing that he had made a critical mistake with her but not knowing how to correct it.
For just a second Honor’s control broke and a tear slipped slowly down her face, but she slammed down on her emotions. It was kill or be killed, and Honor was a master at survival. She gave Gabriel a humorless laugh and said, “You know Gabriel, you are good. Better than anyone I’ve ever run into. I fell for your amazing good looks and domineering bullshit like a ton of bricks. You must have laughed your ass off at how easily I fell into your hands. I won’t lie to you. You have got an amazing skill set in the sex department. You should rent yourself out at parties. You could make a mint. And to be crystal clear for you, I got off so many times last night that I lost count, so don’t worry about my little virginity issue. You did an incredible job and I truly appreciate the initiation.”
She held her hand up to stop Gabriel before he could speak. “You know what I appreciate the most, Gabriel? I appreciate you making it very clear to me what last night was. I was under the mistaken impression that it was one of the most incredibly wonderful, mind blowing experiences of my life, but now I know the truth. It was a good night of raunchy sex that I ruined by being a virgin. Too bad, but hey, listen, when you’re sitting around with all your buddies trading stories and paying off bets, you will know you’re in a win-win position. Just think, you nailed the town freak first and you’ll know that you were ‘really’ first. Whose gonna top that? You must be crowing like a rooster inside, huh? Now get the fuck out of my house,” Honor said in icy disgust.
Gabriel stared at Honor with heavy guilt and regret. There was nothing left of the passionate woman he had been with last night. The person before him was cold, distant and unforgiving. Jesus, what had he done? “Honor . . .” Gabriel tried to say he was sorry. He wanted to explain.
“Get . . . out . . .” Honor said slowly and distinctly, no compromise in her eyes or posture.
Gabriel slowly walked out the door but turned back to say something to Honor. The door promptly slammed closed in his face and the locks flipped in place. He slowly turned and left.
Honor didn’t move until she heard Gabriel’s truck leave. She calmly went back to the kitchen and pulled out three large oversized garbage bags and popped the first one open. She dumped the pastries, plate and all into the bag. She did the same with the saucers, glasses and milk. She tied that bag up and put it by the back door. Taking the other two bags into her bedroom, Honor tore off the comforter, and sheets from the bed and stuffed them into one of the garbage bags until it was bursting at the seams. Honor then gathered up all the pillows from the floor and stuffed them one by one into the final bag and then went into the bathroom and ripped down the shower curtain, s-hooks and all, and stuffed it, the damp towel that hung on the hook behind the door, all the shampoo, soap and wash cloth into the already over-filled bag. She then lugged all the bags outside to her large trash cans and stuffed them inside. She wheeled the cans out to the edge of the road for tomorrow’s pick up.
Going back inside, Honor scrubbed down every surface in the house until everything smelled like lemons or vanilla. Once done, Honor got her keys and her little back pack and headed for the linen store. That night Honor slept soundly under a freshly washed, brand new comforter and sheet set. Nothing was left of yesterday. There was only today. That was all that counted. She had survived.
*****
CHAPTER 3
11 YEARS AGO
Honor listened in a calm, stony silence as Mama Leone verbally ripped the principal apart in his office. Honor, bloody and beaten, sat waiting on a hard plastic chair just outside of Principal Peterson’s door.
The office clerk kept looking up nervously at Honor, as if expecting her to attack at any second, so Honor pinned her with a scary stare until the woman skittered into one of the back offices and left Honor sitting alone. This scene had played out so many times that Honor couldn’t even summon the slightest reaction to the beating or the confrontation taking place behind the Principal’s door. It had become a rhythm of Honor’s life. Don’t fight and get the shit kicked out of you, or fight and still get the shit kicked out of you; and then the big confrontation with the principal before Mama Leone arrived and had her own confrontation with the principal. Nothing ever changed.
Finally, Mama Leone burst out of Principal Peterson’s office and motioned with an imperious hand that Honor should precede her. They left the school and surprisingly, it was the last day Honor ever stepped foot in that school. Mama Leone had made a decision that Honor would be home-schooled until she graduated.
Honor knew that she was a constant worry for Mama Leone. More than once her foster mother had told Honor that she had turned from a shy beautiful spirit into a cold indifferent ghost. To hear Mama Leone tell it, Honor had stuffed her true nature down so far that there was nothing left of the little girl she had been. She blamed it all on the abduction and claimed the transformation started when Honor had overheard the police detective in San Francisco tell Mama Leone that Honor had been damn lucky to escape when she did, that they had found another girl’s body, with a similar tattoo, floating in the bay. The authorities thought the dead girl and Honor were somehow targeted by flesh peddlers who dealt in sending young, innocent girls over to Asia to be sold to the highest bidder. Tattoos were the newest fad for the buyers. The more exotic the girls looked, the higher the price.
Honor had gone into deep shock and the doctors had to sedate her to stop her hysterical screams. The one thing that became clear to Honor was that she was marked for the rest of her life as someone whose face and body was seen as a commodity, nothing more. Despite the number of cosmetic and plastic surgeons they had seen, the answer was always the same. They might be able to laser off a bit of the tattoo, but there was the risk of scarring or sight loss if they tried to work too close to her eyes, and the expense would be astronomical. Honor had finally given up and refused to go to any more appointments. It was done. Nothing would change. She had to live with it.
So Honor had come back to Atlanta and listened to the disparaging or pitying remarks, took the blows until she taught herself how to fight back, and learned how to avoid purposeful gropes from both boys and men. But most importantly, Honor had learned how to become what her face reflected, a scary, unpredictable, calculating freak. She could turn it on, or off, at will. No one ever saw the real Honor. The most she would allow was a watered-down version to get past people who really meant no harm, but still saw her as not quite normal. Buck O’Leary was one of those people. The day she met him, he gave her a chance at a type of freedom and Honor took it.
Due to Ma
ma Leone’s unwavering tutelage, Honor had graduated high school a whole year early. Without school, Honor felt like a freeloader at Mama Leone’s house, so she started looking for work. She had the predictable results. No one was willing to hire a freak for normal jobs like waitressing or office work. They wouldn’t even hire her at any of the local convenience stores or gas stations. The owners were afraid she would draw in a bad element. Her choices were very quickly narrowed down to stripping and prostitution, neither of which was at the top of Honor’s dream job list.
Honor had just gotten off the public bus after another failed interview at a McDonalds, when she spied a sign posted on the chain link fence right outside a construction site. It said, ‘Help wanted, no experience required, dress for dirty work.’ Honor looked down at her short skirt and tight sweater and promptly ran home and changed into a pair of old jeans, a ragged sweatshirt and tennis shoes. She scraped her hair back in a careless ponytail and ran back to the construction site. As soon as her foot crossed over onto the dusty construction area, the catcalls started along with whistles and lewd remarks. Suddenly, someone roared out a command and it went deathly silent. Honor had her game face on and calmly walked to a trailer marked ‘Site Manager.’ There, standing outside the door, was an overweight grizzly of a man who looked like he would rather chew you up and spit you out than waste time talking to you.
Without looking up from his clipboard the big man growled, “So what can I do for you little girl? You lost or something?”
“I’m here about the job offer you have posted outside on the gate,” Honor said without inflection. Her heart was pounding so fast it made Honor feel dizzy, but she didn’t let it show.
“You got any experience, little girl?” the burly man asked, and for the first time cut his eyes to her face. She gave him high marks for hiding his reaction at seeing her tattoo.
“Little girl . . ., I’m taller than you, asshole.” Honor thought. She stood just shy of six feet tall and had a curvaceous figure that attracted men’s attention. She knew what he was thinking, but she would prove him wrong if she could only get him to hire her. Gritting her teeth she said, “The sign said I didn’t need any.” At his scowl she amended, “No, I don’t have any construction experience, and I bet you sucked when you started out too.” Honor muttered the last part under her breath and didn’t realize he had heard her until he roared with laughter.
“Kid, you’ve got balls, I’ll give you that.” He grinned at her, but then got serious. “The pays minimal, five days a week, eight hours a day. No insurance for the first 90 days. You miss a day and you’re gone. If you learn fast, you get more responsibility and more pay. What do you say? Do you think you’re up to it?”
Honor had no idea, but nodded yes anyway.
Eyeing her feet the man said, “You need a pair of work boots and work gloves,” but seeing Honor’s uncertainly he gruffly asked, “What size are your feet?”
“I’m a size nine or nine and a half,” Honor said simply.
Nodding, the man flipped a couple pages up on his clipboard and said, “Come here, little girl.” When Honor walked up to him, he grabbed her long-fingered hand, slapped it on the blank page and quickly traced it with his pen and then released her.
“Monday morning, 7a.m. Don’t make me regret taking a chance on you, little girl, and have your legal guardian sign this so it’s okay for you to work for me,” Buck said, handing her a form.
“My name is Honor Weston, and you won’t regret it,” Honor said taking the form.
“Well, Miss Honor Weston, I hope you live up to that name. My name is Buck O’Leary and I’m your boss and worst nightmare.”
Nodding, and not bothering to dispute his second claim, Honor turned to leave.
“Honor . . .?” Buck called out softly. Honor turned back expectantly. Knowing what his question would be, she just stood, waiting patiently. “Why’d you let somebody do that to your pretty face?”
“Who says I let them?” Honor threw the question at him and walked away. It was the one and only time she ever alluded to the truth. Buck never asked about it again.
Over the next year Honor drove herself into the ground proving that she could do any job they dished out at the construction site. When they told her to haul rocks for eight hours, that’s what she did. Grunt work became her middle name. She never complained, she just did the work, got paid, went home, gave a chunk of her pay to a protesting Mama Leone and started all over on the next Monday morning. The men she worked with finally got the picture that none of their comments or actions affected her in any way and soon began to treat her as an equal. There were always exceptions but for the most part, Honor was left alone to do her work.
If there was a tool Honor wasn’t familiar with, she either watched the other construction workers as they used it or she used her own time and money to go down to one of the large hardware chains to take classes or get instruction on its use. She also studied the building codes to make sure her work never had to be corrected or redone.
Over time Honor mastered every tool they put in front of her. It became a game of sorts between her and Buck. He would ask her if she knew how to use a certain tool, and if the answer was no he would shake his head in disappointment and give the job to someone else. A week or two later Buck would ask Honor about her knowledge of that same tool and she would be prepared and proficient in its use. A gleam of satisfaction would appear in Bucks eyes, but then he was all business again.
One day, Buck pulled Honor aside and led her to one of the big forklifts. He briefly showed her how the controls worked and how sensitive they were. She took to it like a duck takes to water. Within two years Buck had trained Honor on every piece of equipment they had, large or small. Nothing was too difficult or complex for Honor to quickly master.
Buck had to teach her to drive so that she could get her driver’s license in order to work with the machines during works hours. Honor then began taking training courses for different types of heavy equipment and made sure she had the licenses she needed to work on each one.
Her reputation grew as her experience expanded and job offers started pouring in from other companies. At first she refused all offers out of loyalty to Buck, but he finally told her to jump ship when rumors started that their company might be going under.
She left reluctantly and joined a new crew in New Jersey. Her emotional shell was diamond hard by that point, so this new crew was no match for Honor. She did her job, got paid, and sent some money back to Mama Leone, then moved on to the next job. It was a scenario that repeated itself over and over until Honor came full-circle to settle in Dalton, North Carolina to work for her old boss, Buck O’Leary.
*****
PRESENT DAY
“So why are you all here again?” Conner asked lightly.
“It’s a show of solidarity, brother. We’re letting the troops know that we’re all in this together,” Mik Zobrinskya said with a grin.
“Aren’t we ‘silent’ partners? I thought we were in this for the money and nothing else,” Conner said, and gave a side-long look towards Sam.
Sam accidentally-on-purpose elbowed Conner in the side. “Shut the fuck up, asshole, and try to look like you’re serious. This is important. I need these people to step it up. We’re starting to fall behind and I can’t afford too many more delays.”
“Brother, if you want serious, just look to your left. Gabriel looks like a damn thunder cloud. Damn, man, what’s up with you?” Conner asked as he leaned over Sam to speak to him.
“Not a damn thing, just waiting for the meeting to start,” Gabriel said. And I’ll get another chance to be shot down by Honor, he thought in frustration.
“Okay, someone’s a little tense. Maybe we should take him out and get him laid,” Conner leaned back with raised eyebrows.
Gabriel ignored Conner’s comment and continued to stare morosely at the gathered construction workers. He, Conner, and Mik were lifelong friends as well as silent partners in Sam
’s company, Knight Construction. He was more than willing to back Sam up whenever he was needed, but he was really here with one purpose in mind, Honor.
He watched as she entered the room with Buck O’Leary. Even outfitted in heavy jeans, work boots and a long sleeved T-shirt that she wore for work, she was still stunning. Her thick mane of hair was pulled back from her face and lay in a thick braid down her back. When he caught her eye she returned his gaze with the same cold, empty expression that she had worn since that horrible morning weeks ago.
Gabriel pulled his gaze away from her as Buck O’Leary started the meeting. Standing behind Buck with Sam, Conner and Mik, Gabriel was able to see everyone in the room. Buck let it be known that he was not a happy man, and when Buck wasn’t happy, nobody was happy. Too many mistakes were being made, too much careless behavior, and too much bullshit going on at the site. Buck was on a tear.
The group mostly consisted of the crews that were working on the retirement community project, including Honor. Gabriel’s gaze continued to brush over her several times, but her attention was firmly fixed on Buck. Nothing had changed. He had gotten the message loud and clear. As far as Honor was concerned, Gabriel Ryan no longer existed.
“Look, I’ve had enough. So here’s how it’s gonna to be from here on out. Any more screw ups and you’re gone. You want to slack off and fuck around? You’re gone. It’s that simple. I’m tired of baby-sittin’ your asses. You got that? I’m sick of your excuses. You either do your job right or get the hell out and quit wasting my time. That goes for all of you. I’ve had enough of these delays to last me a fucking lifetime. You’d better do your damn jobs, assholes, or you’ll all be looking for work,” Buck roared.